Corsair Flash Voyager Mini 4gb and 8gb Reviewed

I love USB thumb drives, I’ve got all sorts of them in varying shapes and sizes floating around my desk at all times. The ones I’ve got range in various sizes, shapes colors and capacities, I just think they’re one of the coolest and most useful gadgets out there today.

I’ve got a double review for you today, I’ve got both the 4gig and 8gig versions of the Corsair Flash Voyager Mini USB Drives. These drives are rubberized for ruggedness and extremely small in size to be able to take them, and your data of course, anywhere with you. The Flash Voyager Mini is a cap-less drive giving it bonus points in my book as I just hate it when I lose the caps, the Voyager Mini is a retractable style drive that’s easy to use and looks great.

The Corsair Flash Voyager Minis comes packaged in the sealed plastic clamshell style package, so you’re going to need scissors or something to open them up.

Nothing comes with the drives, except for a keychain that is already attached, and since it’s a retractable style drive there’s no cap to lose either.

As I mentioned in the intro the Corsair Flash Voyager Mini is rather small, it has a rubberized exterior as well to keep it protected from shocks and general everyday wear and tear making it a durable and portable little way to carry your data with you.

The Flash Voyager Mini utilizes a cap-less retractable connector plug which easily opens with the flick of the thumb, and its ergonomic rubberized housing makes it easy to connect and disconnect from any computer. This makes it the perfect flash drive for users with busy and active lifestyles. Utilizing the latest Chip-on-Board technology the Flash Voyager Mini is the perfect synergy of size, looks and function.

What would a review of this type be without some comparison testing and for that I use SiSoft Sandra 2009 Removable Storage Benchmark test. I’ve compared both Corsair Flash Voyager Mini drives up against a few others I’ve got on hand to see how they perform. Of course this just gives us an idea of performance, these drives are not advertised as the fastest out there as some other drives are.

Well we see the 4gig performs a bit better than the 8gb, but from my other experience with USB drives this is normally the case overall.

Next up we’ll take a closer look at the Removable Storage Test, specifically the 256MB files test:

Here we se a different story, in term of read performance both of the Voyager Minis are equal to the other leading drives, but we also learn it’s the write performance where the Corsair drives take a hit.

As I mentioned these aren’t sold as fast drives, nowhere does it mention these are super fast drives or even the speeds actually, unless I missed it somewhere… but they’re pretty good overall. The actual ‘feel’ of using them compared to the other drives is about the same, though you can tell they are a bit slower on the writing, but it’s not much really. I’m not in that big of a hurry to need a super fast drive, and I don’t think anyone else is either.

Conclusion:
The Corsair Flash Voyager Mini USB Drives are small and durable making them great to protect your data while on the go even in the harshest of conditions, and even just going about your day to day business.

They’re nice drives really, they’re lightweight and well made, yes they’re not the fastest out there, but that’s not their selling point, ruggedness and durability is, and that the Voyager definitely is!

Sorry I don’t want to bash, but you only did a synthetic benchmark, that doesn’t represent how the sticks perform in actual daily tasks! Ofcourse you can use synthetic benchmarks but you need real benchmarks as well. Also you only used 1 benchmark. You cannot call this a review, sorry to say…

I have just bought this nice looking 4 G Flash Voyager mini (Corsaire). It is written on it being compatible Windows 98, but it is not recognized by my computer. Neither could I hence find the fitting driver on the net. If somebody could give me a hint I would be very grateful to him.
thanks in advance,
Souzou

Kimberle

Are you sure the drive isn’t recognized – or does it just not get a drive letter? The drive letter issue is easily fixed: I never used Windows98 (95 to XP) but I think this should still work in that OS. Go to computer management – probably can find it under the control panel or right click the My computer icon on the desktop.
Click the plus next to the storage section
This should list all drives connected to your computer
You should see the word removable under the flash drive
right click on that drive and choose change Drive letter paths
Give an unused drive letter
then click OK twice.

That should cure it.
If you don’t see the drive there – test that usb connection on your computer with some other usb device. maybe the plug is bad.

damn

how the hell did you make this review without saying the most important thing
READ & WRITE SPEED

f or me
u write a
c rap review
k aput

Mohammed

The Corsair offers a far bigger advantage over speed.
That is a lack of vulnerability, as can be found in other conventional sticks.
On a conventional USB stick, the connector is the weak point.
It is likely to show bad connection between connector and the stick itself, when handled roughly (or just carried in your pocket).
Not so with this Corsair stick, where the connector and the memory are one piece of hardware, and therefor less vulnerable.

Jspittler

Thank goodness I am not by myself. I am extremely disappointed with the Voyager Mini 4GB. It is the only flash drive that I have ever had a problem with. As mentioned by SOUZOU below, it just doesn’t work sometimes.
According to Tech Service 3% are just bad drives. Thank goodness brain surgeon’s don’t use this drive.
Recommended fix: spend several hundred with a data recovery source. Thanks Corsair, but no thanks.
Take your RMA 1750360 and RAM it.